Beautiful
by Cognitivism
Summary: Mercedes tries to convince Santana that her hijack of the Cheerios' performance assembly is a good idea. Set during the episode 'Home'.


**Disclaimer: **I totally own Glee and all the characters associated with it. In my dreams.

**Author's Note(s): **I was watching 'Home' this morning, as you do, and couldn't help but wonder how Mercedes managed to convince the Cheerio's to ignore Sue's orders and go off on their own little very anti-Sue tangent. Thus this story was born. I hope you enjoy it. I've never written anything Glee related before :-).

**Beautiful**

Okay, so Brittany wasn't exactly what you'd call 'book smart'. She knew that. Hell, everyone that had ever met her knew that. It certainly wasn't the worlds best kept secret. Some people had even gone as far as to call Brittany 'stupid'. Not very often though, and the people that did had a surprising habit of showing up to school the next day full of sincere apologies and a broken nose. She knew that Santana was always the cause of these sudden changes of heart but it worked for them both that Brittany pretended that she didn't. Anyway, the point is that though Brittany may not know her seven times table or what the capital of France is (she was still convinced it was an F) she is good at reading people. At least, she was better at it than Santana. That's what Brittany assumed anyway. She was either better at it or Santana was as good and just didn't really care how people felt. One or the other.

This was why when Mercedes ambled over to them with her eyes cast down, Brittany knew something was wrong. She also had a feeling that whatever their, now, fellow Cheerio was going to say to them, Santana really wasn't going to be interested. Especially after the particularly gruelling training session they'd just had where Sue had blamed every little fault in their routine on Santana. Though the head Cheerio had shown no outward reaction to the jibes and insults, Brittany knew that Santana took every word to heart.

Mercedes drew level with the two cheerleaders and Brittany smiled at her. It was actually quite impressive that the girl had found them because Santana had insisted that they sit outside on the bleachers for their study period. Something about feeling claustrophobic in the library. Brittany wasn't quite sure what that word meant, possibly something to do with clowns because Santana hated those, but she had nodded anyway and followed her best friend outdoors.

"Hey, Mercedes," said Brittany, after seeing that the other girl seemed unwilling to break the silence.

"Hey, Brittany," replied Mercedes softly. "Erm, Santana? I need to talk to you about something."

It took Santana a moment to respond, and when she did it seemed to require a great deal of effort on her part. "What do you want, Luther Vandross?" she finally said without looking up from her nails. She had been intently filing them for the last twenty minutes.

"I need a favour," said Mercedes reluctantly.

Santana's head shot up and she looked at the girl with an incredulous expression on her face.

"You need a favour?" repeated Santana, as though she hadn't quite caught it the first time.

Mercedes faltered and Brittany shot her an encouraging smile. She really didn't know why people were so scared of Santana. It was weird.

"Uh, yeah," said Mercedes nervously. "I uh…want you to change the Cheerio's routine for tomorrow's assembly."

"You want me to do _what_?" snapped Santana.

"Change the–"

"Yeah, I heard what you said, Wheezy," Santana interrupted impatiently. "Have you lost your tiny mind?"

"Uh no, I–"

"Do you have any idea what Sue would do to me?"

"Yeah, but–"

"She would literally unhinge her jaw and swallow me whole."

"Santana," said Brittany firmly, before her friend could launch into a tirade of epic proportion. "Just let her speak."

The girls face softened a little and Brittany had a feeling that she was mentally counting to ten to calm herself down. That's what Miss Pillsbury had told her to do last time she'd lost her temper and punched a guy in the face. Mercedes shot Brittany a grateful look.

"All right then," said Santana eventually. "You have a minute and a half to convince me. Go."

"That's not fair!"

"One minute and fifteen seconds," said Santana, glancing at her watch.

A look of intense annoyance crossed Mercedes' face, but she obviously realised that the clock was ticking and quickly explained to the two Cheerio's what she wanted to do and why. It took longer than her allotted minute and a half, but, much to Brittany's amusement, Santana didn't stop her until she had finished talking.

There were tears in Mercedes eyes when she finally trailed off from her explanation and it made Brittany sad. She liked Mercedes. She was cool and had a really good voice. A glance at Santana though told her that nothing good was going to come from this conversation. For a few moments nobody said anything.

"No," said Santana finally.

The hopeful look on Mercedes face fell and she hung her head. It was exactly what Brittany had been expecting of course, but she still felt just a little bit disappointed that it had come to pass anyway.

"San…" Brittany whined in that voice she knew Santana couldn't say no to.

"No, Brittany," said Santana, avoiding eye contact. Then she looked at Mercedes with something almost akin to sympathy. "Look, I can see where you're coming from, but I just can't."

"It would be good for school morale," said Mercedes, brushing off her first failure. Her eyes shone with determination and Brittany couldn't help but feel a little inspired by it.

"I don't care how people feel about themselves," said Santana firmly. "People's body image issues are their own problem."

Mercedes sighed and looked to Brittany for help. For her part, Brittany was torn. She really wanted to let Mercedes do her thing. It would be fun. She also didn't want to disagree with Santana. Not only was she their captain, but she was also Brittany's best friend. She didn't want to upset anybody.

"What song do you want to sing?" Brittany asked to stall for a bit of time to make up her mind.

"Beautiful by Christina Aguilera," said Mercedes.

Brittany squealed. "I love that song!"

"No," said Santana, slamming her hand down in fury.

"Come on, Santana," said Mercedes softly. "I know you care about what other people think of you. You can't seriously tell me you've never been self conscious or insecure?"

"Never."

Well, now that was just a lie.

"What about the time that boy asked you why your skin looked dirty and then told you to go back to Mexico?" asked Brittany as innocently as she could, ignoring the look of mortification on her friend's face. "You cried yourself to sleep that night."

"Not the same, Brittany!" said Santana, shooting her a panicked look.

Brittany knew she was going to be in trouble for divulging that particular piece of information later. It would be worth it though if she and Mercedes could convince the head Cheerio to vary from their usual dances and try something a little bit different. Besides, the hopeful look was back on Mercedes' face and it was a lot nicer than her sad face.

"The other Cheerio's will never go for it," said Santana, folding her arms in what Brittany had learnt was a 'classic defensive position'. She was pretty sure her friend was just looking for an excuse now.

"The other Cheerio's will do whatever you tell them to," Mercedes pointed out. That was very true and they all knew it.

"Well–"

"Please, Santana," said Mercedes soulfully, holding the girls gaze.

Then Santana's shoulders slumped and Brittany knew they had won.

"Fine," she said bitterly. "Fine."

A bright smile lit up Mercedes and she almost threw herself forward to give Santana a hug. Brittany quickly held out her hand and shook her head vigorously. She would not be held responsible for Santana's actions if the 'gleek' tried to touch her.

"Thank you," Mercedes settled on saying. "Thank you so much."

"Sue's gonna kill me," Santana simply replied mournfully.

Mercedes pulled out a wad of paper from her bag and handed it to Santana. From what Brittany could tell it seemed to be copies of the sheet music to 'Beautiful'; presumably to give to the other team members.

"Oh," she said with a frown, "There's just one more thing."

Santana groaned dramatically. "What? What else can you possibly want? Is me being kicked out of the Cheerio's not enough for you?"

There was a pause. "I don't want Kurt to know," said Mercedes.

A cruel grin caught Santana's face. "Trouble in paradise with homo explosion?"

"Something like that," Mercedes muttered with a frown.

Santana snorted with humourless laughter. "Whatever. Just get out of my sight before I change my mind."

Mercedes scurried away and Brittany smiled benignly at her friend who was now staring down at the paper in her hands with a worried expression.

"You're doing the right thing, San," said Brittany, resting her head on Santana's shoulder.

"Thanks, sensei," replied Santana sarcastically.

"Is that like a phone?" asked Brittany in confusion.

This time when Santana laughed it was the good kind of laugh and not the 'I hate you' kind. "Yeah, Brit. That's right."

* * *

**Author's Note(s):** Hope you liked it. Constructive criticism will be greeted with a jaunty fanfare.


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